Tips on pulling out narration and central ideas

[elliotterae]

I'm using WWE and I really like the program, but both of my girls are so detail oriented it seems to be unreasonably difficult for us. I'm new to homeschooling and to a formal writing program. I have a very difficult time getting them to condense into 2-3 short sentences.

I will read the passage and then ask the questions provided. They answer it in complete sentences for me, no problem. Then I get to the "tell me in two brief sentences" part.  Their answer never matches the suggestions. 

The suggestion will be something like.  "Ojo was eating, but Scraps could not eat. So she jumped over the water, but she was afraid to get wet."

 

My girls want to say " Ojo was eating the bread and cheese that he packed for lunch but this confused Scraps. She tried to eat but discovered she could not chew or swallow. The cat knew better than to try to eat. So Scraps was jumping over the water and then Ojo told her to be careful. She didn't know what he meant when he said her colors would run."

 

Now, I am glad they remember that much and can phrase that out on their own. My 7 year old has made a world of improvement in just a week or two from when we started and we couldnt get a complete sentence that wasnt a run-on (and on and on and on) out of her. But, no matter how much I go back and ask the basic questions and ask them to tell me just those answers in 2-3 sentences, neither of them seem to be able to do it.

 

Any tips?

 

What I have been doing is trying to reason them down to less words.  I will say " Ok, so he was eating is the main point, what he was eating is an extra detail that makes the story interesting but do we need to know what he was eating to understand what happened? And how about chew and swallow, what do those things mean, can we just say she couldn't eat?"  And we eventually get it down to something closer to the examples. My fear is that I am going to end up really stabbing myself in the foot when it does come time to do some "creative" writing or when I try to tell them to add more details to their sentences later. At the same time, I know when it comes time to summarize a longer passage or a chapter or entire book, they are going to be lost if they can't learn to leave some of this detail out.

 

I'm just really new to this whole process. Maybe I'm being too critical but I want to make sure I'm doing it right and not doing them a disservice. I would love any tips, pointers, ideas, or examples.

[Miss Tick]

What level of WWE are you using? I thought the first level just had them tell you one thing they remembered. How did that part go?

 

This kind of learning can take forever (from the parents' perspective). The help you are giving sounds good. Slowly make your questions more open-ended.

 

Perhaps you could try reading them one really detailed sentence and then ask them what is the main idea, what are the details. I would start with a sentence from the selection, but you might be able to use their sentences eventually if they need it.

[Chrysalis Academy]

My 2nd grader is exactly the same.  You are doing fine.  Summarizing is a hard skill, it will take awhile to get it down.

 

One thing that helps is for you to have a clear distinction in your own mind - and explain it to them - of the difference between narrating (telling back a story in their own words, with details) and summarizing (picking out the main points).  It sounds like narrating is no problem for them.  Go ahead and have them practice that with other books that you read.  Not all the time, but once or twice a week, when you close a book, say, "Now let's do a narration.  Tell me what happened in this story." and let them tell it back to you, in order, with all the detail they remember.  This is valuable.

 

When you sit down to do a WWE lesson, remind them, "This isn't a narration - I don't want you to tell me the whole story.  I want you to give me a summary - just tell me the main idea."  Use the questions in the workbook, or make up your own.  Sometimes if it is clearly a chronological piece, I will say "Tell me what happened at the beginning . . . in the middle . . . at the end."  Or, I will look over the prompting questions in the workbook, but rather than asking them, I will say, "Now it's time for a summary.  The most important parts are x and y.  Give me 2 sentences that include x and y." 

 

I do it different ways for different passages.  It is a useful and important skill - I can't tell you how much I wish my current 6th grader had had more practice with this in the early years!  It just takes time.  WWE2 has you practice this for a whole year!  That shows you that it isn't unusual for a kid to take that long to learn the skill.  It is worth it!

 

FWIW, my dd really struggled with summaries when we first started WWE2, but after just 10 weeks she has really improved.  It will come.